In 1987, there were only five races outside Europe on the calendar and now, twenty years on, thereare nine. Even so, the tradition of introducing major updates to the cars when returning to the comfort zone of Europe continues, or maybe the teams just feel there are so few people in the Sepang and Sakhir grandstands that it’s not worth showing them anything new.
Red Bull Racing is no exception to the rule and the RB3s that Coulthard and Webber will race at the Circuit de Catalunya on 13 May have undergone changes in several areas. The team’s technical director, Mark Smith, talks us through what has been done and why. “Our plans always included an extensive bodywork update to arrive in time for this race. We also planned to introduce a step forwardin transmission performance for Spain. On top of that, the first three races had thrown up some reliability issues and the Barcelona test last week means that hopefully we have addressed those too, notably the problem we had with the fuel flap. The old design caused us problems at each race so far, either staying open when the car was out on track or staying closed when it should have been open for the pit stops.
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